Samsung makes the curved-display Galaxy Round official

Apparently some big companies have decided that curved displays are the next big thing. Just a few days after LG told us about its upcoming flexible displays, Samsung has done one better by announcing its first phone with a flexible display, the Galaxy Round.

The Galaxy Round is basically a Galaxy Note 3 with a curved display (and, as far as we can tell, without an S Pen). Like the Note 3, it has a 5.7" Super AMOLED display, only here it's using new flexible display technology. The phone itself, of course, isn't flexible, but the flexible display opens the door to its (fixed) curved state.

Samsung threw in a few software features that take advantage of the phablet's ability to tilt. When the phone is lying flat on a table with music playing, for example, you can tilt the device left to go back a track, and right to advance. There's also a feature Samsung calls the Roll Effect, which lets you check notifications when the screen is off by rolling the device slightly in your direction.

Otherwise the Round appears to carry over most of the features from the Galaxy Note 3, including its faux leather back, 3 GB of RAM, 32 GB of internal storage, and 1080p display. It's a bit lighter than its non-curved counterpart, at 154 g (the new Note is 168 g).

It isn't clear yet whether customers are looking for a phone like this, but Samsung's marketing machine has a way of pitching new phones and features in ways that make them seem desirable. And, for what it's worth, the Round is using an excellent mobile device as its blueprint. It also isn't yet known what kind of global rollout the Round will get. As of now, it's only set to launch in South Korea for 1.09 million won (which converts to US$1,015).

You can hit up the embedded video below, for a sneak peek of the Galaxy Round's Roll Effect, demoed by a Samsung employee.